Stop selling sweets or pay the price, hospitals warned

Hospitals have been told to eliminate almost all sugary drinks or face a ban on selling them.

Chocolate bars and sweets from hospital shops and vending machines must also become smaller and sandwiches need to have fewer calories, NHS England has decreed.

Simon Stevens, its chief executive, said previously that he would implement an “NHS sugar tax” before the government announced a levy. Last year he raised the prospect of a fizzy drinks ban on hospital grounds and has confirmed that one will be introduced next year if sales do not come down.

WH Smith, Marks & Spencer and Greggs are among chains to have agreed that sugary products will make up no more than 10 per cent of all drinks sales in hospital. Other…